Page:The story of Saville - told in numbers.djvu/18

 Hidden from all but a poet’s soul and heaven anointed eyes. And now he had come to regret the fierce fanged physical pain That for long, long weeks had maddened, had seethed and swirled in his brain, Whose pressure was past enduring, whose passing was blest relief, Yet whose worst throes seemed now more kind than this unbearable grief, This travail and sweat of spirit, where the universe seemed to swim In hatefullest frantic chaos, a lunatic’s furious whim. Strange! that because of a trifling loss, scarce more in creation’s scheme Than a gnat in a summer woodland, a leaf afloat on a stream, Because two vials were shattered, God’s purposes high should seem Only an idiot babble heard in a horrible dream. But as he impotent girded and railed, and longed to stifle his care In the dull narcotic round of his room, and counted the winter air 14